


Untitled

by pancake5882



Series: Notsogreatfanfic's Minecraft Youtube fics [1]
Category: Team Crafted
Genre: M/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2019-09-20
Packaged: 2020-09-23 20:57:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 12,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20346616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pancake5882/pseuds/pancake5882
Summary: In which Sky falls in love, learns why he can speak to squids, wears some cool shades, and becomes the hero of Minecraftia.I originally published this fic on Tumblr in early 2013, under the username Notsogreatfanfic. The story has always been named "Untitled", and always will be. The writing isn't up to my current standards, but I'm still fond of this story, so I've decided to re-upload it here, as-is.This is a story about Adam and Ty's fictional Youtube personas, not about the Youtubers themselves.





	1. A Wrong Turn

"WATCH BODIL40! SUBSCRIBE TO BODIL40! ADMIRE BODIL40!" SkyDoesMinecraft yelled, spinning around in circles and punching things with great enthusiasm. Exploring a Bodil40 map with Deadlox was a favorite activity of his, and after months without a new map to see, it sure was good to be back.  
"Because he's pretty cool, for a squid," Deadlox agreed, opening a chest he had just noticed, "Ooh, butter armor!"  
Sky opened the chest as well and quickly equipped his armor. He turned to glare at his friend. "BODIL40 isn't a squid. Accusing him of being one is slander of the worst kind!"  
"I bet you're a squid too," he said.  
Sky punched him.  
"We should get started on this map. I don't wanna be anywhere near the ground when the mean mobs start spawning," Deadlox said, still looking pleased with himself.  
"Yeah, we'd better get going." Sky charged at the first jump, "YEAH! UNTAMABLE!"

~~~

"I feel like BODIL40! is trolling us," Sky said, staring up at a painting nervously. It depicted the 'now kiss!' meme. As he recalled, this map had been made with him and Deadlox in mind.  
"Do you think it's one of the map's rules, Baby?" Deadlox asked in his most seductive voice, eyeing him flirtatiously.  
"Shut up, Ty," Sky said, aiming a few halfhearted punches at his friend. Pretending to find each other attractive was an old tradition and no reason to be truly annoyed, especially since both the Sky and Dead armies seemed to like it better than butter and massive TNT explosions. He briefly wondered what it would be like to actually kiss Ty, but threw that thought away hastily. No need to fantasize about such an impossible occurence.  
They spent a few minutes good naturedly beating each other up, then continued to parkour their way across the map.  
Deadlox slowly drew ahead, leaving his friend behind. He travelled in silence for a while. Then he made a nervous yelping noise. "Adam?"  
"Mmm-hmm?" Sky asked, carefully leaping over a worrying river of lava with practiced ease. He nearly landed on an ominous pressure plate, somehow avoided it, and kept going. He hoped Ty hadn't managed to fall in lava. He didn't really feel like helping his hapless friend through another case of post-respawn lag, Deadlox was a royal pain in the backside while his mind and body were resyncing after a death, and even repeatedly setting zombies on his friends rarely helped his mood.  
"If I were to be poisoned to death by cave spiders, would you avenge me?"  
Sky's eyebrows shot up high enough to be seen over his sunglasses and he started parkouring faster. Being killed by poison would be sure to put his friend in a snit of epic proportions. "Is this a hypothetical question?"  
A long-seeming pause then, "No."  
He started running as fast as he could, suddenly very scared. "Talk to me, Ty!"  
"The spiders are dead. I beat the whole lot of 'em. I'm losing health fast though."  
"Hey. Sky."   
"Shut up, Squid."  
"The map's on hardcore now," it said, "If you die, you'll never respawn."  
Oh no. "Why should I believe you?"  
"Because we have full control of the world." He found himself suddenly teleported underwater, surrounded by his worst enemies. Then he was back on land.  
"Hey. Hey. Sky."  
"Shut up!" Sky yelled automatically at the squid, spitting out water as he spoke.  
"Hey. Sky. The only way to get the cure for Dead-guy is to bargain with us."  
"So whadya want then?" he asked angrily.  
"You. Duh. We give you stuff to save Dead-guy's life, you give us you. Take it or leave it."  
He wanted to scream a defiant refusal, but the stakes were too high. Whatever his mortal foes might do to him, he doubted it would be as bad as losing his friend. "All right, it's a deal."  
A bucket of milk and an instant health potion appeared in his inventory. Well, at least they were keeping their promises today so far. That was good.

~~~

There was Deadlox. He was leaning against a tree and looking paler than usual, eyes dull, and he was wheezing for breath. Cave spider venom had a tendency to cause such a reaction, making your airways swell and effectively preventing most oxygen from entering your lungs, which in turn made you rapidly weaken and suffocate. The only cure was milk, which would neutralize the poison's effect, and some type of fast-working healing food, which would help you stay alive until you could breathe properly again. By all accounts, not getting the cure in time was a terrible way to die.  
Sky knelt down next to Deadlox and gently helped him to sit up, brushing his long hair out of his eyes with considerably more care than was strictly necessary for such a simple action.  
"Hey there, Baby," Deadlox said, smiling slightly.  
Sky chuckled and handed over the bucket of milk. "Drink that. It's good for you."   
He was nearly too weak to lift the bucket, but finally succeeded in drinking all the milk. Sky gave him the health potion. He drank that as well.  
"Ty, you couldn't hear what the squids said, right?"  
"Nope," he said. His wheezing was greatly diminished. The two-part cure had been very effective. "I just can't hear them the way you can."  
"I had to bargain with them for your life. In exchange, they're taking me prisoner."  
He attempted to punch the butter general in the face. Failed. "That's stupid."  
"It's better than watching you die."  
Another poor attempt at gratuitous physical violence. This one was better, but still missed Sky's face by a good half inch.  
Realizing that Deadlox would soon be strong enough to actually hurt him, Sky moved his head away by a few inches.  
"Where?"  
"I don't know. They didn't give me the details of the agreement."  
Deadlox sighed. Then, apparently changing moods quickly, attempted to use his seductive voice again. "Looks like it's now or never then. So shall we?"  
"'Shall we' what?" Sky asked. He had a feeling he wasn't going to share this memory with his army. Much as they loved watching a Bodil40 map playthrough, unexpected drama, and a lot of flirting, he thought this might be becoming too personal to show anyone.  
"Oh I dunno, how 'bout this?" with a sudden burst of unexpected strength, he pulled Sky closer and kissed him.  
Sky was going to pull away with a yelp of shock, but he suddenly realized that he quite liked this. The most cool and thoughtful part of his brain was wondering why they'd waited so long to do this, but all the other parts of his brain were too busy enjoying kissing Deadlox to care about anything else.  
Which was why it came as a great and depressing surprise when someone grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him off Deadlox. It was a Squidward. "Time to go," it said in its scratchy, bored voice.  
Sky sprawled on the ground, glaring up at it and its friends. He suddenly felt grateful that he and Deadlox were both still fully clothed. "What the... Couldn't you have told me more politely? DID YOU REALLY HAVE TO THROW ME LIKE THAT?"  
It delivered a painful kick to his side.  
He clenched his teeth, then forced himself to laugh. No way was he going down without a few more clever remarks. "So you wanna be my sidekick, huh?"  
Deadlox, who was slowly getting to his feet, sighed. He knew there was no hope of fighting off the Squidwards in his current condition, not to mention the fact that the map had come with absolutely no weapons. And Sky was making even stupider jokes than usual. "Do we get to say goodbye?"  
"Wasn't that what you were doing when you were holding the Squid Slayer in your arms and shoving your mouth against his?"  
Sky, who was now on his feet and clutching his sore side, turned bright red. Whether from embarrassment or anger was anyone's guess. "Wow, I think I just managed to lose even more respect for you guys. If that's even possible. How long were you watching us?"  
"It doesn't matter. They're squid," said Deadlox. He stepped closer, "You gonna be okay?"  
Hair ruffled gloriously by the breeze and buttered by the morning sun, Sky nodded. "I can handle them all. I'm untamable, remember?"  
And then he was teleported away into a dark, cold cell on the ocean floor. What little light that could reach these depths illuminated thousands of squid. All were watching silently. All were pressing in close to his cage, tentacles curling as if they were resisting the urge to strangle him then and there.   
"We've been waiting a long time for this, Squid Slayer," one of them said softly, "If you have any prayers to say, now is the time to say them."

~~~

And far away, Deadlox stood staring at the spot where Sky and the Squidwards had been. His eyes glittered with quiet fury. "I'll rescue you, Adam," he whispered, "Just you wait."


	2. Up from the Ocean

His wrist ached. He tried to move it into a more comfortable position, which only ignited a flare of pain in his ribs. He flinched, and suddenly became aware that his entire body hurt. Oh yes, now he remembered, they’d dropped him off some stupid cliff.  
Well, they’d gotten the Squidwards to do it, anyway. Not much of a difference.  
“Hey. Hey. Sky.”  
He opened his eyes, whimpered at the bright glowstone light shining in his face, and closed them again. The light hurt now that they’d taken his sunglasses, and who wanted to look at someone as ugly as his latest visitor anyway?  
“Hey.”  
“Shut up,” he mumbled. Being rude to them might be foolish, but he was still the legendary Sky, and he still couldn’t be tamed. Not even months of bad food, imaginative torture, and the taunting of squid could bring him down.  
“Hey.”  
“I said shut up. What is wrong with you?” he said more loudly, still keeping his eyes firmly closed. Leave me alone. Leave me alone! LEAVE ME ALONE!  
“Hey. Sky. Want a butter apple?”  
He opened his eyes to look at the squid. It was holding a delicious-looking butter apple in its tentacles. His mouth started watering; all he’d eaten for weeks were carrots and bread. “GIVE IT TO ME.”  
“It ain’t free,” the squid said smugly.  
“WHAT DO YOU WANT THEN?” He hoped the price wouldn’t be too extreme. Butter apples might be good, but he wasn’t going to do anything really disgusting to get one. He might be desperate, but he still had standards.  
“Grovel, beg, plead.” The squid said in an exceptionally obnoxious tone. “It’ll be funny to watch.”  
Well that would be… nasty. But doable. Not worth it for a single butter apple though. “Give me my sunglasses back as well, and I’ll do it,” he said in a cold, almost-defiant-but-not-quite tone.  
“All right, but hey, you’d better make this good,” it said, squirming about happily in the water.  
Sky shuddered involuntarily. Even though his captors hadn’t yet done anything really horrifying to him, he’d read enough fanfiction to find being their prisoner terrifying. That fic he’d read once where he’d been pregnant with a baby squid still haunted his dreams sometimes.  
Oh right, he was supposed to be trying to obtain a butter apple and his glasses. Treating a squid with anything less than utter disdain just wasn’t in his nature, but he had to try. He got down on one knee, clasped his hands together, forced his nose to unwrinkle and his eyes to be puppy-like. “Oh great lord—-what’s your name again?”  
“Glazed Old Fashioned Donut.”  
Donut. Okay. He wondered what all his friends back at home would think. “Oh great lord Glazed Old Fashioned Donut, whose wits are sharp as a diamond sword and eyes are fierce as the great Wither himself. Your filth—-I mean glory—-is unmatched and, and, and… your majesty is like b…b…butter itself. I beg you, please give me gifts so I may feel less insignificant in your presence.” Dang, pleading with a lesser life form was hard.  
The squid wriggled thoughtfully, then edited the items into Sky’s inventory. “Hey, my family’s gonna love seeing this memory!”  
Oh. Well shit. “You’re gonna share it?” Sky said in his most ear-shattering tone. He had a lot of ear-shattering vocal volumes, but this one was his finest and most physically painful to hear. Deadlox had sometimes liked to joke that his headphones were part of his standard outfit just to muffle that sound, should he ever have the misfortune to experience it.  
Donut started to swim away, chuckling, but then the gleam of a butter sword shone through the dark water and the squid was sliced cleanly in half. Then, swimming swiftly, an armored Minecrafter with a familiar face came into view.  
“TY!” shouted Sky deafeningly, putting on his sunglasses and lunging to press himself against the glass of his prison.  
Deadlox smiled brilliantly, “Sky!” he said. Not as loud a reaction perhaps, but the emotion was just as strong. He pulled out a pickaxe from his inventory and started breaking the glass.  
Suddenly remembering the last time they were together, Sky blushed. “Ty… I… You… I didn’t… You… I…”  
“Oh shut up. We can talk about it once we’re on land,” he replied in a soothing tone, finally breaking a large enough opening for his friend to fit through. He ducked in to replenish his helmet’s air supply, and threw another helmet at Sky, “Put that on. It’s Respiration enchanted.”  
He was willing to wait to talk about this, he decided. Maybe he could figure out a nice speech about how he was sorry for listening to a Deadlox whose brain had no doubt been muddled by poison, and hoped they could still be friends. He’d probably end up losing their friendship anyway, but at least he’d have tried.  
“Hurry up, they’re coming for us,” his rescuer said.  
He whimpered and followed. Staying with the squid almost sounded better than the awkward conversation he knew was coming.

~~~

They were hiding in a small shelter in a taiga biome far from civilization. It was as far from the squids as they could go before nightfall, and no Squidwards could live nearby.  
A lone torch was set in the middle of the floor, and the two travellers sat near it, warming their hands over its small but bright flame.  
“Look,” said Sky after a bit, “I think I took advantage of your venom-addled mind that day. I shouldn’t have kissed you. I’m really sorry.”  
“Adam,” Deadlox said. He started making gratuitous amounts of wooden planks, blushing slightly in an unusual show of embarrassment, “You’re making the mistaken assumption that I wish you hadn’t.”  
Sky started making planks as well. It seemed like a good idea, although he wasn’t sure why. Maybe the scent they released had relaxing qualities or something. He’d have to ask Etho when they got home.  
“On the contrary, I’ve come to the conclusion that I would gladly let you do it again any time.” Running out of raw wood, he started turning the planks into sticks. “Not that I expect you to, of course,” he said hastily.  
“Are you messing with my head again?” asked Sky, shoving aside his stack of planks, and tossing pieces of dirt at his companion in an irritated way.  
Deadlox started throwing the sticks he had made at Sky in retaliation. He suddenly realized what he was doing, and silently willed Sky to not think he was being creepily suggestive. “Not this time.”  
“Yeah. Like I’d believe that.”  
“Look,” he mumbled, letting his hair fall more completely in his face, “You’re kind of hot and you’re an annoying jerk in all the right ways and you get startled and you’re good at kissing and I kind of just love you a bit and now you’re gonna murder me again I bet and—-“  
“Oh shut up.” Sky picked up the torch, moved it to a wall, and pulled Deadlox closer.  
Deadlox paused. “Adam, do you ever take off those sunglasses? ‘Cause they kinda get in the way.”  
“No. They never come off. Never.”  
“Okay.” He frowned, perplexed, “Why not?”  
Adjusting them almost automatically, Sky practically growled out his reply. “It doesn’t matter. Just don’t try to take them off.”  
“All right, I’ll drop the subject,” Deadlox said in a calm tone. He suddenly really wanted to know why Sky was so desperate to keep them on, but he had a feeling now would not be the right time to push the subject. Poor guy was probably exhausted after his imprisonment… Oh yeah, probably he’ll need some first aid. Should’ve thought of that earlier… “Off topic, but did the squids hurt you badly? Do you need first aid?”  
“They had some Squidwards dump me off a cliff yesterday. Messed up my wrist a bit,” Sky said, trying to sound like it wasn’t a big deal. He failed a bit, because now that he thought about it, it was starting to really hurt again.  
Deadlox grasped Sky’s arm to inspect it. “Looks okay to me.”  
“The other one,” he said in a dry tone, holding out his injured arm helpfully.  
“Oh.” Deadlox considered the injury carefully, “That looks kinda bad, actually. It looks like it’ll need to be splinted.”  
“Damn,” Sky muttered. Personal experience had shown him that Deadlox was better at causing harm than he was at fixing it, and even very competent Minecrafters like AntVenom couldn’t make arm-splinting without mods less painful.  
“I’ll kiss you if you don’t yell while I do dis,” Deadlox offered.  
“I don’t need bribes. I’m man enough to take this in silence!” Sky’s voice rose with each syllable to a pitch loud enough to compete with the roar of a mother enderdragon protecting her eggs.  
“Of course you are,” Deadlox said amusedly.

~~~

Several long minutes and a lot of very loud swearing later, Sky’s wrist was firmly held in place by a surprisingly well crafted splint. Deadlox also held Sky, although not as tightly as the splint did, and was patiently trying to calm him down.  
“Thanks, Ty,” Sky said after he’d stopped ranting unhappily about life, the universe, and everything. “I think I’ve been a bit ungrateful lately and,” he cleared his throat uncomfortably, “I’m really sorry. You don’t deserve to hear me whining all the time, you’re just too good a friend for that.”  
Deadlox moved his face closer until it was inches from Sky’s. “Adam,” he said.  
Sky gazed back.  
“Shut up.”  
One of them extinguished the torch, and the tiny cabin in the taiga biome went dark.


	3. Return to the City

“Hey,” Deadlox said, nudging his peacefully snoring companion with his shoe and completely ignoring the fact that he was making the blankets dirty. “Get up, lazy.”  
“Gdrrfrggkl,” mumbled Sky incoherently, throwing his arm over his eyes and trying to go back to sleep.  
“I got us some fish for breakfast. Lovely, shimmery, fresh fish.”  
“Doncaretalljusgoway.”  
Grinning, he pulled one out of his inventory and dangled it over Sky’s face by its tail.  
Apparently it was still damp enough for water to drip off it, because in a moment Sky was fully alert and wiping his face frantically. “Argh! Fish water! Ty, why you do dis to me?”  
“I spotted the Spawn City farmlands in the distance while I was fishing, so we might make it home tonight if we hurry. Come on.”  
Ah. Well that was definitely worth waking up for. “Okay, okay. Don’t look, I’m getting dressed.”  
Deadlox rolled his eyes. “Dude… is this really necessary? Aren’t we boyfriends now or something?”  
“DON’T LOOK,” Sky said firmly.  
With a resigned sigh, Deadlox turned away and made a show of covering his eyes. Sky sure could be weird sometimes.

~~~

They ate breakfast and headed homeward at a hasty pace, which increased to a dead run as a creeper attempted to kill them to feed its young. Fortunately they avoided the worst of its explosion, and escaped with their lives. They continued to sprint for a while, but finally slowed to a walk to catch their breath.  
“Remember, we aren’t going to tell anyone,” said Sky, apparently assuming that Deadlox and any watching gods would understand what he was talking about.  
Fortunately Deadlox did understand. “I still don’t get why not. It’s not like anyone’s gonna hate you for thinking I’m hot. It’s a perfectly natural reaction to being around someone with my good looks, baby.” He smiled a dazzling smile and dodged Sky’s punch with practiced ease.  
“I don’t wanna tell people, Ty!”  
“Okay, okay. They can figure it out on their own.” Sheesh.  
They entered the vast farms that surrounded Spawn City near midday, and entered the city itself as the sun dropped below the uncurved and infinite horizon in its usual unscientific manner.  
“Holy crap,” Sky said, turning his head from side to side to stare at the row of Recruits lining the sides of the road. All were dressed in butter-colored leather and carried ceremonial butter swords, and stood perfectly at attention. He unconsciously stood a bit taller at the sight; this was his army, and seeing everyone looking so majestic made him proud. They hadn’t fallen into disarray during his absence!  
“I guess someone spotted us on the way here,” said Deadlox.  
Sky nodded in stunned agreement, saluted his army, then forgot the conversation as he spotted none other than MinecraftUniverse half marching, half running down the center of the road in full ceremonial butter gear.  
“JASON!” he yelled, sprinting toward his friend.  
TrueMU hurriedly saluted, then prepared to catch Sky in case the butter general was going to enthusiastically tackle him, or just faint. With someone like Sky, you just never could tell. “Adam! We all missed you a lot. You’re all right, I hope?”  
Fortunately, Sky managed to skid to a stop before he could crash into the space marine. “Ty saved me just in time. They were going to destroy my reputation forever, and I was so startled,” he said dramatically.  
“Thank you, Ty,” TrueMU said in a warm way no opaque space helmet could hide, “I still wish I could’ve come along, but I guess you did just fine without me.” He paused to look at the triumphant Sky Army for a moment, “I guess you’re both pretty tired. Want me to teleport us home?”  
“You’re an operator now?” Deadlox said curiously.  
“The admins didn’t want to be constantly keeping an eye on Sky’s army or Kermit, so they gave me the task. The bright side is that I can teleport and put people in adventure mode now,” he replied wryly.  
“Well that’s nice of them,” Deadlox’s voice dripped with sarcasm. Neither Kermit nor the Sky Army was known for being easy to babysit.  
“I’d like to teleport home. I can beat up Kermit for you in exchange for your help,” offered Sky.  
“I don’t think that’ll be necessary. He’s currently banned from Spawn City for pushing people into lava,” TrueMU replied.  
“I am somehow not surprised,” said Deadlox.  
Sky laughed delightedly. “Nope, I’m not surprised either.” He turned to look at his army again, “OKAY GUYS YOU CAN GO IT’S GOOD TO BE BACK AND SEE YOU ALL THANK YOU FOR THE WELCOME YOU ALL ARE GREAT BYE.”  
They saluted.  
Sky and TrueMU saluted back. Deadlox didn’t. He didn’t much enjoy acting professional, and he was tired anyway.  
TrueMU teleported himself and his friends to their apartment building.

~~~

“Adam. Wake up. We’re home. The coffee mod is usable again.”  
Sky glared up at Deadlox, who was looking more pleased than anyone should at this early hour. “MINE.”  
“Say ‘please’,” Deadlox said.  
“You woke me up. It is,” he considered the clock for a good five seconds, adjusting his sunglasses as if they enhanced his eyesight instead of softening bright light, “Six-thirty AM. I don’t need to say ‘please’, because you’ll be giving me the coffee as apology for doing that.”  
He smiled. “You can have the coffee now since you said ‘please’, even if you didn’t actually mean it.”  
“Screw you. Apologize to me or…” he frowned in thought, “Or I won’t drink the coffee!”  
They stared at each other in confusion.  
“…I don’t think that was what I meant to say,” Sky said.  
“No, I don’t think you meant to say that either,” agreed Deadlox with a snicker.


	4. Parkour and Closets

They headed down to the lobby of the building. MinecraftUniverse was lounging on one of the many couches set around the room, reading something funny on his laptop. He stopped laughing and turned to look up at his friends as they came to join him. “Hey there. You guys up for a parkour map today?” he asked hopefully.  
“Can the squids hack into it?” Sky asked. Being imprisoned by them again was not a prospect he found even slightly appealing. His wrist was still a bit sore from the time they threw him off that cliff, and he never wanted to be without his sunglasses again.  
“I doubt it. There’s been a huge amount of security improvement lately, and all the hacker genius types have been doing everything they can to break the system and failing.”  
“Well I wanna do it. I miss hating everything for no good reason,” Deadlox said. He started jumping around the room at various speeds and distances.  
"Can we bring butter weapons?" Sky said.  
TrueMU began glowing slightly, as admins do when giving Minecraftia difficult commands to execute. Not being a skilled admin yet, his friends could both hear him mumbling under his breath, “Gamemode… creative.”  
Sky couldn’t help laughing softly.  
“I’d like to see you try modifying the universe itself,” TrueMU said sourly, tossing weapons and armor to his friends. Muttering again, he commanded, “Gamemode… survival.”  
Sky promptly fell off the couch laughing.  
“I’m sorry about this. I think he was with the squids too long and it made him meaner than usual,” Deadlox said apologetically.  
“It doesn’t matter. I admit it, I’m still bad at this,” he replied, trying to pretend he wasn’t annoyed and instead trying to sound embarrassed.  
“Sorry, Jason, I guess I’m being a terrible friend again,” said Sky, regaining his composure, “Thanks for the armor and weapons.”  
MinecraftUniverse stood up, putting his laptop away in his inventory. “You can make it up to me by losing,” he said, leading the way to the new map.

~~~

Sky could barely believe how horribly he was doing. The parkour wasn’t actually all that tricky, and yet he was falling with the frustrating regularity you normally only see when Kermit is playing with you on a lava parkour map.  
“You okay there, Sky?” asked MinecraftUniverse, stopping to watch him.  
“I have never been better in my whole entire life EVER,” Sky said ironically. He attempted to wipe the dust from his glasses without removing them, and failed.  
“I can help you out if you’d like,” TrueMU offered.  
“NO. I CAN DO THIS MYSELF,” Sky said.  
TrueMU nodded and chose his next words carefully. He’d have to be very diplomatic to avoid angering his friend further. “Of course you can do it yourself. You’ve done more parkour maps than I could ever hope to remember. You’re allowed to teleport if you aren’t in the mood to do another one today.”  
The Squid Slayer folded his arms over his chest stubbornly. “I’m going to do this, and I’m doing it legit.”  
“Okay. We’re not going to think worse of you if you change your mind though.”  
Deadlox hopped back to join them, gazed deeply into Sky’s glasses for a bit, and finally spoke up. “Adam.”  
“What? Did I fall in cow poop and not notice?”  
He gazed at Sky for a bit longer. “Your hair looks pretty in the sunlight.”  
“TY!” screeched Sky, blushing. He suddenly felt an intense desire to beat up Deadlox, and his newfound goal gave him the speed and reflexes to complete twenty-three jumps in a row (“nonononono,” muttered Deadlox frantically as he raced to escape the Squid Slayer’s wrath) before losing his footing and suddenly being unwillingly reaquainted with the ground.  
TrueMU watched with amusement as Sky determinedly struggled to catch Deadlox. Obviously something had changed between his friends during their absence.

~~~

With a whoop of triumph, Sky tackled Deadlox. They rolled about on the jump for a bit, beating each other with great enthusiasm, until they fell off the edge and fell to the ground far below. They stopped fighting abruptly, and began doing their best to help each other up.  
Sky looked at Deadlox apologetically. “Sorry about that, I didn’t mean to make us fall, much less use you as a pillow.”  
“I’m all right,” Deadlox said. A few of his ribs hurt a lot, but he’d had worse.  
“You’re sure you’re okay?”  
“Yeah. And I forgive you.” He kissed his boyfriend quickly.  
Sky shut up.


	5. The Friendly Shadows

“Looking back, I think it might have been wise for me to keep renting my own apartment. For appearance’s sake,” Sky said, lazily crafting wooden planks and stacking them next to his boyfriend’s couch.  
“Yeah,” Deadlox said, “Oops.”  
“So now everybody knows we’re in love,” Sky continued, “And the number of so-called ‘Skylox shippers’ who are now delightedly blogging about this is terrifying. I swear they’re nearly as thrilled by this as they were when the Captain and Ant started dating.”  
“It is pretty weird, but I gotta say, the fanfiction is hilarious. The things people think we do with butter and squid tentacles…”  
Sky shuddered. “Please say no more. I don’t want to know.”  
“No, you definitely don’t. It’s wonderfully imaginative though.”  
“Shut up.”  
Chuckling quietly, Deadlox obeyed.  
“Ty,” said Sky after a bit, “Have you ever seen me without my sunglasses?”  
“No. I’ve never taken them off, or seen you take them off, or anything.”  
“Not even when I was with the squids?”  
Deadlox shook his head. “Nope.”  
“That was what I thought,” Sky said. “I guess you probably don’t know why I wear them either. I don’t think I’ve ever told anyone.”  
He watched Sky curiously.  
“You know how painful looking at sunlight is after you’ve been in a cave without torches for a while? Well I… I can’t go outside or even in bright light without experiencing that unless I wear these. I tried finding a mod creator to fix whatever the hell is wrong with me, but none of them could actually figure out the cause, much less the cure.”  
“No wonder you keep them on all the time,” Deadlox said.  
Sky smiled slightly. “People used to tease me for putting them on even when it was raining. So I started never taking them off. I don’t think people even realize they aren’t just part of me now.”  
Deadlox chuckled. “I notice them, I just don’t mind them that much.” He let his voice turn seductive, “You make sunglasses look sexy, Baby.”  
That made Sky really smile. “I can’t help it. My handsomeness makes anything I wear look great.”  
“It’s a fact,” he agreed.  
“But what I’m really trying to say is,” Sky adjusted his glasses in a nervous way, “You should probably see me without them at least once.” He looked around the room with concern, as if fearing that some Skylox shipper was currently hiding under the table and noting down everything they did, then carefully removed his sunglasses.  
Deadlox tried to find the right words and failed.  
Sky raised one eyebrow.  
“Can we just put out all the lights in the city so you don’t need to wear those sunglasses any more and I can just admire how nice you look without them?” Deadlox said admiringly, breaking one of the few torches in the room for emphasis. It wasn’t that Sky’s eyes were especially unique or stunning (his admirers might even be disappointed by the complete lack of butter- or squid-colored flecks in his irises), but there was just something about them that Deadlox really liked. He wished English had words to explain what it was that made Sky so physically attractive to him.  
Sky laughed. “Nah. I’ve been wearing them almost nonstop since I was twelve, and I’d rather not be seen without them in public.”  
“Oh.” Deadlox sighed tragically. “Okay.”  
His eyes were starting to water and ache from the light. He punched down a few more torches, then picked up his sunglasses and set them on his lover’s nose. “Nice look. It suits you.”  
“Thanks.” He grinned and took off his headset. “Here, try this on.”  
Sky did, taking a few moments to admire the elegant design and pleasing color combination first. “Is it true that you got this headset just to muffle my yelling?”  
“Nah, I actually got it to protect my hearing while using TNT.”  
“Oh yes. How could I ever forget that?” Sky got up and walked over to a decorative butter block table to look at his reflection.  
Deadlox came to join him, grinning at the sight of himself in Sky’s glasses. Not that he could actually see anything very well while wearing them, they were extremely dark. “You forgot because you’re stupid, obviously.”  
Sky punched him automatically. “WOW. THAT WAS REALLY NICE.”  
A friendly fight ensued.

~~~

Deep in the oceans of Minecraftia, far beyond the reach of sonar and X-Ray mods, the squids plotted their revenge.


	6. The Overwhelming Truth

Sky going to spectate a Survival Games to annoy BajanCanadian and Hacksource. He felt like they had been causing way too much trouble lately and deserved to be trolled in turn, but he had the feeling he could never hope to do more than mildly annoy them as a fellow tribute. Instead he resolved to shower them with butter ingots and splash potions of harming. It’d be fun, even when the inevitable happened and he was sentenced to three days of community service for disrupting the national sport.  
He registered as a spectator and took off, grinning with delight. Flying was, without a doubt, a wonderful sensation. He wished he had permission to fly anywhere, he’d troll Kermit, Husky, and Deadlox like crazy…  
As he floated happily over the arena, writing snarky private messages to people, he realized that he really didn’t feel like doing this after all. No, Sky decided, he’d much rather go to the ocean today. Kill a few cephalopods, enjoy the weather, relax in the company of other sunglass-wearers, splash around in the ocean and roll in the sand just to piss off Deadlox… Sounded great.

~~~

He plodded peacefully down the beach, pausing to let some fans pose with him for a picture before making his escape. The sun blazed down brightly enough to be irritating to his eyes, even with his ever-present sunglasses, and Sky began to feel like diving into the water and hiding in its cool darkness for a while.  
The urge gradually became stronger until finally he shrugged and jumped in. He was a strong swimmer, and soon he was confidently diving deep under the ocean’s surface and leaving land far behind. Normally he was cautious around water, but today he felt unstoppable.  
Of course, willingly entering the domain of your greatest foes is always a terrible idea.  
They attacked silently. One threw a nausea potion at him. About ten others rushed to restrain him, pinning his arms to his sides so he couldn’t draw his sword. He struggled desperately to free himself, failed miserably, and prayed to Notch that they were going to kill him. A quick death and a respawn would be much more enjoyable than another few months of torture.

~~~

Of course they didn’t kill him. They took him to a new underwater prison that was much like the old one, threw him in, and left him to alternately beg for help and scream defiance for a while. Which is exactly what he did, very loudly, for hours, until his voice broke and he could barely even whisper. Only then did they come back to bother him.  
“Fuck you,” he whispered.  
“YEAH YOU THINK YOU’RE SO GREAT, HUH? WELL YOU ARE. YOU KNOW WHY?”  
“Because I’ve killed so many of you.” he told them with pride.  
“NOPE. NOT EVEN CLOSE. YOU KNEW YOU WERE ADOPTED, RIGHT?”  
Yes, his parents had adopted him. Why the hell did the squids want to bring that up?  
“WELL GUESS WHO YOUR REAL PARENTS WERE. GUESS WHY YOU UNDERSTAND US. GUESS WHY YOU CAN’T LOOK AT BRIGHT LIGHT. GUESS WHY YOU SWIM SO WELL. GUESS!”  
Sky had a feeling he knew where this was headed. He waited silently.  
“YOU’RE ONE OF US, SKY. HOW’ D’ YA FEEL ‘BOUT THAT?”  
He still said nothing, although his eyes began to widen with fear behind his glasses.  
Another cephalopod spoke. It looked and sounded older, and its skin was faded with age. “You were an experiment. The perfect merging of squid and human. Designed to understand both languages, so we could finally get those monsters to understand we were intelligent and leave us alone. The experiment failed. You couldn’t survive underwater, and we were forced to give you to the humans.”  
“AND YOU THANKED US FOR GIVING YOU UP BY KILLING THOUSANDS OF US,” the younger squid said.  
“You kept yelling at me. Nobody else could hear you. They thought I was crazy. I wanted you all to shut up,” he said weakly. He had a horrible feeling that they were telling the truth, and he knew his reasons for killing them were stupid. “I learned to pretend I didn’t hear you, but every time I used a boat or was dragged to the beach, it was a nightmare.”  
“WE CHECKING TO SEE IF YOU WERE OKAY, YOU STUPID PILE OF RAW PORK CHOPS.”  
“No,” Sky said faintly. He shouldn’t believe them, they were disgusting monsters who had tortured him and almost killed Deadlox permanently. They were evil. Of course they’d lie if they thought doing so would throw the Squid Slayer off balance.  
“Ask some human to scan you for squid code, then. You don’t need to believe us,” the old squid said.  
“I’m in an inverted fish tank. How the hell can I do that?”  
“We’ll let you go, stupid,” it said.  
“But… but you don’t do that,” whispered Sky. He wanted to yell, his throat just wouldn’t cooperate.  
“If you’re one of us, you’ll be more cruel to yourself than we ever were to you.”  
“So I just won’t get myself tested.”  
It watched him smugly. “We thought of that. Do you know why you decided to come to the beach and have a nice swim today? Do ya?”  
Oh no. Oh no. He backed away involuntarily.  
“In the Squid Army, there are the leaders and the followers. The leaders have telepathic abilities, and can remotely control the followers. One of our finest leaders made you come to us, influencing you so subtly that you never suspected a thing. Now that you know, it’ll be harder to control you, but we’re still more than capable of making you do whatever we want.”  
His back connected with the glass of the tank. “Stay away from me and my mind. I’m warning you, if you do this the Sky Army will slay you all.”  
“If they’ll even trust a squid hybrid.”  
Sky gestured rudely at them.  
It ignored that, instead beckoning forward a few cephalopods who had gone unnoticed up to this point. They arrayed themselves neatly around the tank and watched him intently.  
He felt… different. Squiddier. He wanted to swim, blow up butter with TNT, maybe hang out with a bunch of friends and tell speciesist jokes about humans. Get a nice squid boyfriend with a gentle, deep voice, headphones, and an annoying sense of humor…  
Oh Notch, they were controlling his mind! Drawing on his knowledge of fantasy fiction, he focused all his thoughts on Deadlox. Human Deadlox, not the ocean-dwelling one his more squiddy thoughts found so attractive. Keeping your thoughts focused was supposed to protect you from mental attacks, right?  
“Hey! He’s blocking us out. Bring more help.”  
Sky clenched his teeth and did his very best to hold off the vile sea creatures as they tried to control his mind. He found he could hold off five at once, but after six, seven, and eight showed up, the battle was hopeless. He resigned himself to his fate, and tiredly hoped that they wouldn’t make him hurt anyone.

~~~

Sky materialized in the ocean near Spawn City. He spent a few minutes enjoying the water before remembering he had important matters to which he should attend. His thoughts were largely scattered and rendered meaningless by the eight squid controlling him, but occasional Sky thoughts slipped through, telling him that he needed to avoid talking to anyone. And that he needed to do something about his clothes, which were soggy and would raise questions. He needed to keep as low a profile as he could here.  
With the stealth and cunning of a celebrity who wants to avoid his rabid fans, he made his way through the city to the apartment building where he and Deadlox stayed. He only encountered the new cleaning person, and she was too busy blushing and moving out of his way to even notice the condition of his clothes and hair.  
Under normal circumstances, Sky would have apologized for dripping water all over the nice clean floor. The other beings inhabiting his head refused to allow it though, and instead made him continue upstairs in silence.

~~~

“I’m home, Honey!”  
Human Sky focused on that voice and instantly became more alert, squid Sky hoped that the owner of the voice had grown tentacles and blue skin, and all the other squids went into panic mode. Despite the fact that his mind was a confusing mess, he finished putting on his clean clothes and went to greet Deadlox. It seemed to him that not greeting Deadlox would make him start asking awkward questions, which was not something he really wanted at the moment.  
“Did you and Husky blow up the map again?” he asked. His voice still sounded off, damn it.  
“Yeah. We used so much TNT that they noticed in the nearest town, which was a good thousand blocks away. It was pretty cool.” He eyed Sky thoughtfully, “What’s up with your voice?”  
“I think I might be coming down with a cold,” he lied.  
Deadlox’s eyes narrowed. “You look like you’re scared shitless.”  
“It’s a trick of the light. I’m fine.”  
“There’s sand on the floor, and water too. And your hair looks damp.”  
“Huh, that’s weird. I wonder how that happened…”  
He glared at Sky.  
Sky valiantly tried not to squirm.  
“All right, spit it out. What did the squids do to you this time?”  
“You’re being kind of creepy right now, you know, asking loads of questions and jumping to BATCRAP INSANE CONCLUSIONS.”  
He raised one eyebrow. “You’d be worried too, if you found me tracking sand all over the house and looking scared.”  
“We can have this conversation later. I have places to be.” Sky’s voice was gone again, darn it. He’d been hoping it had magically repaired itself.  
Deadlox sighed. “Fine. Just… just be careful, okay? I don’t wanna have to rescue you again.”  
“I’ll try,” Sky said.

~~~

The admin glanced up as he hurried in. “How may I help you?” she asked automatically.  
“I was told today that I may be,” he struggled awkwardly to say it, “part squid. A hybrid, if you will. For the sake of my peace of mind, I’d very much appreciate it if someone could run a test on me.”  
She typed busily at the keyboard before her for several seconds, then looked up. “Second room to your right.”  
“How much do I owe?”  
“One diamond, or equivalent.”  
He handed her the required amount in butter and entered the scanning room.  
The door snapped shut behind him. He felt a sudden lag spike freeze him for what seemed like a split second, then all felt normal again, although he felt more tired than before. The door remained closed for a while.  
He waited patiently. Admins were known for their love of making normal folk wait. Made them feel important or some crap.  
They burst into the room suddenly, crackling with power and armed with shimmering diamond swords.  
“Put your hands up where we can see them,” one operator snapped.  
Oh great. He could tell this was going to be interesting. He slowly held them up. “What the heck?”  
“Silence, impostor!”  
“What?!”  
“Search him,” the loud admin commanded.  
Someone rapidly searched his inventory. A couple of squid ink sacs, a stack of butter ingots, a butter sword, and the butter apple Old Fashioned Donut had given him scattered on the floor.  
“Check the sunglasses too? They look dangerous.”  
“What the hell?” Sky asked, outraged, “I need—-“  
“SILENCE!”  
Someone pulled off his sunglasses and, he assumed, started checking them for explosives. He couldn’t tell for sure though, as the light in the room was causing his eyes to water and burn with pain. “I have a medical condition, I need those.”  
All the admins proceeded to not show the slightest sign of concern.  
“No hazardous items. The squids must have sent him here as a diversion.”  
“If that’s the diversion, then….”  
The roar of TNT filled the air. The frames per second fell dramatically.  
He heard his sunglasses fall to the ground, and lunged to find them.  
“Ban him. We need to go help. Now,” the loud admin snapped.  
He desperately snatched the glasses from the ground and put them on. The world warped around him, and he was suddenly outside Spawn City territory. He could see the city in the distance, entire ocean side gutted by explosions. His stomach twisted with horror. He was a squid, Spawn City was wrecked, thousands of Minecrafters were currently attempting to respawn, many of his friends were no doubt among them. He wanted to help, but he was banned from the city. Trying to enter would result in nothing. All he could do was wait.

~~~

The admins had been considerate enough to tell Deadlox that Sky was, in fact, half-squid. They had briefly mentioned that Sky was banned. However, they hadn’t bothered to tell him squid-Sky’s precise location before rushing off to assist freshly respawned individuals and decrease Minecraftia’s current lag issues.  
He couldn’t blame them, really. One banned half-squid versus the needs of thousands of people? Obviously the thousands should take priority.  
Deadlox smiled grimly. The admins might be needed here, but he wasn’t. He was free to go look for Sky if he wished.  
So as the sun set, he searched.

~~~

Something slammed into Deadlox’s back with all the force of a powered mine cart. He sprawled on the ground and struggled to grab a weapon, heart pounding fearfully as he realized that he couldn’t. Whatever it was, it had his arms pinned in place, and was much too heavy and strong for him to throw off.  
His fear dissipated somewhat as his attacker rasped out a happy-sounding greeting, “TY!!!”  
“Adam?” The name came out in a gasp, his lungs being far too squished to allow any other type of sound.  
Sky released his slightly suffocated boyfriend and helped him to his feet, manner suddenly apologetic. “Sorry, Ty. I was just so worried about you. Are our friends all right? The Sky Army? Everyone?”  
“Most of our friends are trying to respawn right now, but will be fine. AntVenom survived, of course. Because he’s AntVenom, and he’s pretty much immortal.” He glared at Sky, “But right now I want to know what this ‘Sky is a traitor or an impostor’ thing is all about.”  
Sky flinched. “I’m not! I’m me, and I’m loyal, and I’m,” his voice started working right again, “NOT A DISGUSTING MONSTER SO DON’T SAY I AM PLEASE I’M SORRY I SHOULD HAVE JUST TOLD YOU EVERYTHING AND YES I AM ACTUALLY A DISGUSTING MONSTER I’M SO SORRY I WISH—-“  
“Just tell me what’s going on, please,” Deadlox said.  
Sky explained the situation as they punched down trees and built a shelter. The story was frequently interrupted by his frantic apologies and the attacks of hostile creatures, but finally the house was ready and the tale told.  
“Well shit. It’s like we’re in a bad piece of fanfiction and the writer is a sadistic weirdo,” said Deadlox.  
Sky snorted in a way that expressed his amusement and frustration admirably, then remembered his worries and started adjusting his sunglasses nervously instead. “So do you believe me?”  
“Not really, but I guess I’m gonna stay with you anyway.”  
He pulled off his sunglasses so he could more effectively give Deadlox a confused look.  
“You’re so much fun to annoy,” he said, “I doubt I could find any other guy who gets pissed off like you do.”  
Sky sighed, delivered a rather halfhearted slap to Deadlox’s face, then moved to rest his head on Deadlox’s lap. “Good night, Ty.”  
The headset-wearing Minecrafter smiled affectionately down at the Squid Slayer, then leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes. “Good night, Adam.”


	7. A Thousand Arrows

“Adam!” Deadlox almost shouted, “Admins!”  
Sky blinked. “What?”  
“They must have come to take us home.”  
Sky was about to scream a loud yes, when suddenly an image of a bunch of technical Minecrafters jabbing him with needles and studying him FOR SCIENCE appeared in his mind. He tackled Deadlox and shoved them both behind some bushes, quickly covering Deadlox’s mouth so he couldn’t yell.  
Deadlox raised one eyebrow. Sky interpreted this as a, ‘Adam, why are we lying in the bushes with you on top of me?’.  
He twitched his eyebrows in reply, ‘Because I don’t want to be a test subject. I already do that in every adventure map ever’.  
‘What do you mean?’ Deadlox asked by way of a puzzled frown.  
Sky shrugged, ‘They’ll want my squid hybrid DNA’.  
He wiggled his eyebrows in a way that clearly said, ‘Adam, you’re being silly’.  
Sky sighed and released Deadlox. Using standard English, “You’re right. Sorry.”  
“What was that about?” asked the headset-wearing Minecrafter.  
“What do you mean?”  
“All that eyebrow-wiggling. It was like you were trying to talk to me through facial expressions.”  
Sky, now experiencing profound disappointment at Deadlox’s lack of observation skills, explained his thoughts in English.  
“You may be right. I dunno what they do with mutants,” said Deadlox thoughtfully.  
“Don’t use the word ‘mutant’! It’s just mean.”  
“Mutant,” he mumbled, snickering.  
The Squid Slayer punched him.  
“Ow!” Deadlox yelped, “Truths! Truths!”  
“‘Truths’?” Sky teased, “Don’t you mean ‘truce’?”  
A violent fistfight ensued.

~~~

The fistfight stopped suddenly when they heard the sound of humans drawing closer. They stared at each other nervously, Deadlox pressing his hand against his new black eye, and Sky gingerly feeling his sore nose.  
“By order of the Spawn City administration council, the men known as Sky and Deadlox are required to show themselves!” bellowed an admin neither of them recognized.  
“I think I’d better go find out what they want,” Deadlox whispered.  
“No. Who knows what they’ll do to you?” Sky whispered back.  
“Well they’re not gonna kill me, and they might be friendly,” he replied, “You don’t want to be exiled forever, do you?”  
“I guess not,” said Sky, “Be careful, Ty.”  
Deadlox smiled, squirmed his way out of the bushes, and went to greet the admins.  
“Oh hello. Nice timing, guys, I would have been killed by that spider if you hadn’t distracted it.”  
‘That spider’ tried to not laugh.  
“Do you know where Sky is?” the administrator asked pleasantly.  
“We split up during the day so we can find more stuff. He could be anywhere,” said Deadlox, shrugging.  
The admins all looked at each other, except for an apparently eyeless geometrically patterned one who emitted a series of high-pitched chirping noises instead.  
“Okay,” a dark-haired woman said, “We’d better just bring him in.”  
A guy wearing a purely decorative Iron Man suit and sporting bright green hair grabbed Deadlox by the arm. Deadlox made a startled noise and delivered a nasty kick to some sensitive part of the fake Iron Man’s anatomy, which made him let go abruptly, double over, and produce sounds of intense pain. Sky winced in sympathy; He’d been in more than a few fights that had ended in exactly that way.  
“Bring me in for what?” Deadlox asked, backing away a bit.  
“Minecraftia is on the brink of destruction. The squids have been wearing our defenses and resources thin. We need Sky’s hybrid code and, if all else fails, we can appease the squids by giving you both to them.”  
Deadlox turned to run. There was no time though, and the dark haired woman and a blond man managed to catch him very quickly. The Iron Man handcuffed him.  
A wiser man might have considered making a plan of action. Of course, Sky has never been much good at plans. He decided the skip the ‘plan’ part, and instead jump straight to the ‘action’ part. “KEEP YOUR HANDS TO YOURSELVES!” he yelled, crawling out of the bushes, drawing his sword, and charging the group with complete disregard for personal safety.  
Deadlox’s eyes widened. “Adam, NO!”  
“THERE,” Sky bellowed, “IS ONE THING IN LIFE THAT I’M COMPLETELY SURE OF—-“  
An arrow hit him in the arm. He ignored it.  
“—-AND THAT IS—-“  
Another arrow struck him.  
“—-THAT I WILL NEVER—-“  
Two more arrows buried themselves in him. He staggered, caught his balance, and despawned the Iron Man with a few well placed sword thrusts.  
“—-LET YOU BE A PRISONER OF THOSE FOUL CREATURES!”  
The battle raged on for several minutes. The three administrators who still lived and weren’t guarding Deadlox might outnumber and have better gear than Sky, but he was so angry that it hardly mattered. His body simply refused to admit that he had taken a fatal amount of damage, and so he kept fighting.  
Finally the geometrically patterned one struck him down with a final arrow.  
Sky collapsed to the ground and looked up at Deadlox. “Forgive me, Ty…” he whispered.

~~~

Sky and Deadlox stared at each other, looks of identical confusion on their faces.  
“Why are we stuck in the same jail cell?” Sky asked.  
“Maybe we’re in a fanfic and the writer wants us to have hawt prison sex,” offered Deadlox, laughing in his signature quiet way.  
“WHAT IS IT WITH YOU THINKING WE’RE IN A STORY?” the Squid Slayer said loudly, causing a nearby guard to jump and whirl about in surprise.  
“Is this real life? Is this just fantasy? Caught in a landslide, No escape from—-“  
“Oh shut up. This is no time for singing,” Sky said.  
Deadlox shut up.  
They were silent for a while. “I guess I didn’t mean that. I just kind of hate everything right now.”  
Deadlox nodded.  
Sky tried to get up and pace. He found he was still lagging too much from his recent respawn to to manage it, and sat down again. “I guess it’s too late now, but if you think we should break up, I’ll understand. You’ve been through a ton of shit because of me.”  
“To quote you,” he said, shaking his head so his hair wasn’t in his face, “‘Oh shut up’.”  
“I’m serious, dude. You don’t deserve this.”  
“And you do?”  
Sky smiled crookedly. “Yeah, I think I probably do.”  
“Oh keep shutting up. Your stupidity is showing again.”  
“Wow. Was… Was that supposed to be comforting, or was it an insult?”  
“Both,” Deadlox said. “I’m not dumping you. You don’t deserve any of this. I don’t either. We can sit in prison and live out our crappy lives together.”  
“Whoo, yeah. Friendship,” Sky said sarcastically.  
“We can escape and start a revolution. It’ll be your birthday present.”  
“Oh, okay. That sounds pretty good.”  
These bright and cheery thoughts in mind, the two contentedly waited for whatever the Minecraftian government felt like throwing at them. It came sooner than expected, and wore a blue space suit.  
“JASONIMSOSTARTLED!”  
“Good to see you too, Sky, Ty,” MinecraftUniverse said.  
“What are you doing here, Jason?” Deadlox asked suspiciously.  
TrueMU glowed with power as he mumbled a command to Minecraftia, then stepped closer to his friends’ cell. “They can’t overhear us now.” He sighed, “Guys, we’re not all behind this. Me, Husky, Seto, Ant, Dawn, Mitch, Kermit, Jerome… the list goes on. We can’t openly resist the admins at this point because they control Spawn City, but we’re not going to let them hand you to the squid either.”  
“Well how can you stop them if you can’t actually fight them?” Sky asked.  
“Once you’re out of Spawn City, and before you enter the deep ocean, all the human and squid admins’ powers will be severely limited. We have enough Survival Games champions on our side to take down a wither in under five minutes,” he said smugly, “I think we can rescue you guys.”  
The Squid Slayer frowned doubtfully. “All right. Jason, I BELIEVE. Don’t let me down.”  
“I won’t, Sky. And even if we can’t save you both, I’ll do my best to make sure Ty gets away.”  
Deadlox made an incoherent squawk of outrage. “Why not Sky? He shouldn’t go back to them. Do you not care about him?”  
“As a matter of fact, I care very much about him. I care so much that I’m giving your safety priority over his, because—-“  
“BECAUSE HE KNOWS I’D RATHER GO BACK TO THOSE VILE MONSTERS THAN HAVE YOU EXPERIENCE THEIR CRUELTY,” Sky interrupted.  
Deadlox’s eyes glittered with fury. “Asshole gentlemen.”  
They all glared hatred at each other. Well, Sky and Deadlox did. If MinecraftUniverse did as well, his helmet hid it completely.

~~~

“I don’t really get why they want to study me for their hybrid Minecraftians project,” Sky said as the guard who had brought him back from being tested walked away. He settled his sunglasses more firmly on the bridge of his nose and combed his hair with his fingers.  
Deadlox, who was still very angry, snorted. “Because life is a little bitch.”  
“That was eloquent,” said Sky.  
The headset-wearing Minecrafter visibly forced himself to calm down. “Did they hurt you?”  
“Nah. They only do that in the Junglewood movies, I think. It wasn’t bad, and I think it helped that one of the guys studying my amazing squid code was a serious fanboy and didn’t want to let anyone do anything to piss me off.” He chuckled. “Gotta love those fans.”  
Deadlox raised one eyebrow skeptically.  
Sky shrugged. “Very few people are evil all the time. Even the squids gave me an occasional week without torture when they had more important matters to attend to.”


	8. The Resistance

The days went by slowly. Sometimes the two prisoners heard explosions or alarms, or someone stopped by to run some test on Sky, but those were exceptions rather than common occurrences. Occasionally MinecraftUniverse would visit, since he was still an honorary administrator. One time Jerome stopped by once to exchange innuendo-laden banter with Deadlox, which was pretty entertaining for all three of them, until a guard decided to chase off Jerome.  
So it was with a feeling of hopefulness that the two watched as the dark-haired woman, the Iron Man, and a business-suited man teleported in with the soft whoosh of displaced air and a glitter of raw power.  
“And how can we help you today?” Sky asked.  
“Spawn City is losing the war. We’re going to surrender you both to the squids,” the Iron Man said.  
He instantly went from being moderately calm, to being fairly furious. “Don’t you fucking DARE take Ty.”  
“He’s part of the bargain. Sorry,” the Iron Man said, sounding anything but sorry. Judging by the way he was standing, one might hazard a guess that his last encounter with Deadlox was still fresh in his mind, and that revenge still burned in his heart.  
Sky offered him an obscene suggestion which involved heavy use of a cactus and a croquet mallet. In return, the Iron Man took the time to pull off Sky’s sunglasses and kick them well out of his reach before handcuffing him. Sky yelled in pain and surprise, and retaliated by stepping on the admin’s foot. Deadlox threw himself across the room to snatch the sunglasses and casually trip his vengeful rival. The fight might have quickly escalated to ugly extremes, but the dark haired admin halted them both with a glare, and that was that.  
Eventually Sky and Deadlox were teleported successfully down to docks. Deadlox gasped in horror as he looked over the broken city, which was heavily patched with cobblestone and scarred by explosions. The docks themselves creaked wearily under their feet. Sky tried to look, but hastily squeezed his eyes shut against the light and averted his face from the sun.  
“HEY. HEY. SKY, YOU READY FOR THIS? I’M READY. I’M A SQUID.”  
Sky gritted his teeth at the smug tone in its voice and hoped it would burn to death, or at least spontaneously lose all speech capability.  
“I can hear squids now?” Deadlox yelped.  
What? That made no sense.  
“HEY. I’M REALLY BADASS, GUYS.”  
Oh, it was using English, if he wasn’t just hallucinating. He gaped idiotically.  
“THE NEXT GENERATION HYBRID, SKY, THAT’S ME,” it yelled in theatrical style, “SO SEXY, SO SMART.”  
“We’ve brought these outcasts for your kind to do with them as you wish,” the nicely dressed admin said loudly, apparently deciding that interrupting the squid’s bragging would be well worth his time.  
“I KNOW. IT’S PRETTY AWESOME.”  
Dark Hair sighed and unceremoniously prepared to shove them in the water.  
“I’m sorry, but I don’t think we can allow this.”  
Everyone whirled to face the speaker.  
“Oh hello, Jason. Nice timing,” Deadlox said pleasantly.  
“What,” the Iron Man admin said furiously, “Is this about?”  
TrueMU laughed. “You know, it’s a funny story. Some of us video makers got together to chat, and realized that we didn’t really agree with the decisions you guys were making. See, we all like Deadlox and Sky quite a lot, and would choose them over Spawn City any day. Respawns aren’t more than an inconvenience, you know, and torture is a pretty big deal. So we figured we’d come and ask you guys nicely to not send our friends off to the squids.”  
“The decision has been made, and is not open for debate,” Dark Hair said calmly.  
“Then we’re gonna hafta change your mind, Buddy,” called Jerome, pulling his diamond axe out of his inventory and carressing it lovingly with his furry hands.  
“Ooh, Baby. I like the sound of that,” Mitch murmured, flirtatiously batting his eyes as he quickly equipped his chainmail armor.  
Jerome licked his lips. “When this is over, you and me…”  
AntVenom cleared his throat loudly. “Ahem! Maybe now isn’t the best time to let ourselves be sidetracked.” He returned his attention to the hostile administration team. “You wish to fight? Then fight we shall!”

~~~

MinecraftUniverse took full advantage of the battle to rush to his friends’ aid. He uncuffed them both quickly, helping his sun-blinded and disoriented friend to keep his balance. Deadlox rapidly scrabbled through his inventory, pulled out the sunglasses, and pressed them into Sky’s hand.  
Sky put them on gratefully.  
“I gotta get back to the fight. You guys going to be okay?” TrueMU said, pulling an iron sword out of his inventory and offering it to Deadlox.  
“Of course. I’ll get Sky away from the danger zone so he won’t get killed, then maybe I’ll come back to help out,” he said, taking it and hanging it from his belt.  
“I can fight too. I’m useful,” Sky said defensively.  
Deadlox held his hand out for his boyfriend’s inspection. “How many fingers am I holding up?”  
“One. Your middle finger.”  
Shoulders shaking with his quiet laughter, Deadlox shook his head. “Wrong. I was holding up four fingers. Come on, Adam, we both know you aren’t trained to fight blind, and now’s not the time to try and learn.”

~~~

Deadlox lead Sky to a farm that appeared to specialize in giant mushrooms. He converted one of the already houselike red mushrooms into a small, but usable, place to hide from cephalopods and unfriendly Minecrafters. They hurriedly hid inside it, and Sky spent several minutes shaking with relief at the knowledge that he was safe from the sun’s light. Being stuck outside without eye protection had brought back far too many unpleasant memories for his liking, and he couldn’t help being a bit scared by them.  
“You okay, Baby?” asked Deadlox, letting his voice reach its full calming potential.  
“Yeah,” Sky said, “I’m fine. Just a little startled, that’s all.”  
Deadlox chuckled. “Okay. I gotta go see if all our rebel friends need help. You stay here.”  
His eyes might be hidden by his sunglasses, but Sky’s stubborn scowl was still easy to see. “No. I should come with you.”  
“Shut up. Sit. Stay.”  
“You’re an asshole, you know that?”


	9. A World in Motion

Sky strode toward the end of the wharf, unarmed and unarmored. His face was set in a careful display of absolute calm, his hands clasped loosely behind his back. Behind him were arrayed many of his closest allies, dressed in non-confrontational white leather armor. If they carried weapons, they had concealed them well.  
The ocean was still for a while, then it began to churn with tentacled life forms. The English-speaking hybrid squid spoke up, “HEY, WHACHA THINK YOU’RE DOING HERE, SLAYER?”  
“You do dis, Sky,” whispered Deadlox.  
“You can do this,” agreed Dawn softly from slightly farther away.  
He stepped forward and looked down at the ocean, then up at the camera people who were recording, then back at the squid. “Squids, I’m here to offer you a public apology.”  
“YEAH? WELL GET ON WITH IT THEN.”  
Clenching his teeth to force rude words to remain unsaid, Sky mentally rehearsed his speech. Finally he was pretty sure he still had it memorized, and he continued. “I’ve done some really shitty things for really bad reasons.”  
“Don’t swear,” Deadlox hissed.  
Oh, right. No swearing allowed. Maybe he didn’t have it memorized after all. Time to start improvising. “I’ve killed, or ordered the deaths of, so many of your kind. I’ve turned butter into a weapon of mass destruction. We’ve been at war with you for way too long now, and it’s almost entirely my fault.  
“Yes, I still hate you. If you think I’ll ever love the sight of a tentacled life form, you’re wrong. How could I ever forgive you after being you prisoner for three months? But I’ve been a fucking stupid, violent piece of shit and I don’t want to be one of those any more. If you guys are willing to play nice too, I’d like to give Sky Army orders to stop murdering squids. Then we can all live in peace and, well, not friendship exactly, but maybe not absolute hatred either? I don’t know.”  
The squids dove beneath the water to consult for a while.  
Sky stole a quick glance at his army, many of whom were standing at attention along the shoreline. They were waiting patiently, although doubt still showed on their faces. Some of them still weren’t over the fact that their leader was related the the sea creatures they fought, some simply didn’t want to stop fighting. And yet, even now, they still followed him. It was sweet of them.  
He looked back at the ocean as the spokesperson squid resurfaced.  
“WE’LL DO IT ON A FEW CONDITIONS,” it bellowed.  
Someone made a noise of concern, and was quickly silenced.  
“And the conditions are…?” asked Sky.  
“FIRST, THAT YOU NEVER USE ANOTHER BUTTER SWORD EVER, EVEN IF IT’S THE ONLY WEAPON YOU CAN FIND. SECOND, THAT YOU HAVE A MONUMENT BUILT IN MEMORY OF THE FALLEN SQUIDS. AND,” its voice became, if not soft, at least less loud, “Your squid parents want to invite you to dinner because they think that you might be mature enough now.”  
“I… I… I agree to these terms,” he said, stunned. “Sky Army, the war is over. You are no longer permitted to kill squids on sight. Dawn, hand me my sword?”  
She handed it over, giving him a sad smile.  
He smiled back, then took the fragile butter weapon, allowed himself a moment to appreciate its comfortable weight and dazzling color, then knelt carefully, rested one foot on the blade, grasped the leather-wrapped grip tightly, and bent it. The sword was old and heavily used, and the blade snapped with startling ease.  
Every Sky Army Recruit saluted. Perhaps a few shed tears at the sight of their changed leader as well.  
Sky stood and added, “And tell my squid parents to meet me at the beach sometime so we can talk.”  
As they walked away, Deadlox linked his arm through his boyfriend’s and grinned up at him. “You do good, Adam. You do good.”


	10. Life After the End

“Hey. Hey. You gonna wake up, Dude?” Deadlox said.  
“No. Go ‘way,” Sky replied indistinctly, throwing his arm over his face and trying to go back to sleep.  
Deadlox snorted with amusement and tugged on Sky’s arm. “Come on.”  
“I don’t like you. You’re mean.”  
“I know, I’m horrible,” he replied, not a hint of apology in his tone. “But you should get up anyway, because you’re required by legal contract to meet your… other parents today, remember?”  
“Notch damn it, you could have just said so!” Sky shouted. He tried to get up, and did not succeed, “You’re sitting on me. I can’t move. Help. Help. HELP.”

~~~

The meeting went surprisingly well. Sky’s parents were loud, had irritating voices, and never let themselves come within ten feet of the former Squid Slayer, but they were surprisingly intelligent and, in their own strange way, kind. They never cracked any rude jokes about humans, tried to bring up their son’s past mistakes, or mentioned sushi.  
Sky was grateful for that and, in return, he did his best to be friendly and only ask questions that wouldn’t be thought awkward or downright rude.  
Nevertheless, he was glad when it was over.  
He and Deadlox met up and wandered down the beach after the meeting, using all their cunning to avoid the swarm of people who would have otherwise followed them mercilessly. Both loved their fans dearly, but had other matters on their minds at the moment.  
“I didn’t think you were gonna agree to the squids’ terms that quickly,” Deadlox said, tone thoughtful.  
“Losing a butter sword and visiting your weird relatives, versus continuing a fucking stupid war we weren’t even winning?” Sky laughed. “I like butter and hate squid, but I’m not THAT shallow.”  
“No, no, you definitely aren’t. But still, no more butter weapons?” He shrugged, “It just seems so strange.”  
“Yeah, it’ll be a weird change. I’m gonna go shopping for a replacement later today by the way, want to come?”  
Deadlox smiled. “Well actually, I think I might have a tolerable solution to your problem.” He searched through his inventory rapidly, and finally pulled out a sheathed sword, which he offered to Sky.  
Sky took it and drew it carefully. He gaped. “Enchanted iron? Ty, you didn’t… I… You shouldn’t… But… But…”  
“It was used and on sale, just needed some fixing up.”  
“But I…”  
“You can take me out to dinner if you really must repay me,” Deadlox offered helpfully.  
Forehead wrinkled with uncertainty, Sky considered the offer. Finally he nodded, fastened the sword to his belt, kissed Deadlox, hurried to a nearby grassy hill, picked a majestic butter flower, and hurried back. He offered it to Deadlox. “You know, I don’t think we’ve ever gone out on a proper date. Want to go to a fancy restaurant tonight? After that, we can go to a movie or…” He considered the possibilities, “Or buy invisibility potions and troll all our friends. I heard that Kermit was scheduling a The Walls game for tonight.”  
“Maybe they’ll let us blow up the map once they’re done, too,” said Deadlox, eyes gleaming.  
“And we can throw butter at them!”  
“Ty,” Sky said.  
“Yeah?”  
“Every single shitty moment of last year was worth it.”  
Deadlox smiled. “Agreed.”  
Laughing delightedly, they raced off to buy every invisibility potion they could find. Both felt absolutely certain that today was going to be perfect.


	11. Chapter 7 - AU one-shot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was an extra chapter I posted, an AU version of Chapter 7. Posted here for your reading enjoyment!

Deadlox sighed unhappily, “I think we need to talk.”  
The Squid Slayer set down the helmet he had been polishing and looked up, concerned. “What’s wrong?”  
“We… I…” he started. “Crap. This is hard to say.”  
Sky waited.  
“Adam, I… I’m just so tired of this.”  
“‘This’?” he prompted, puzzled.  
“Worrying about you. Being an outcast. Being an enemy of the squid.”  
“There isn’t much I can do to make everyone stop hating me,” Sky said apologetically.  
“Nonono.” Deadlox shook his head. “What I mean is… I need to get away from this. This relationship. It’s destroying me and my life, and I’m… I’m so exhausted. I can’t take much more of this.”  
Oh no, Sky thought.  
“We need to break up. I’m sorry.”  
He wanted to argue. He wanted to beg. But he couldn’t, because he knew Deadlox was right. He, Sky, had a mess of a life, and he had no right to make anyone else share that mess with him. He remained silent.  
Deadlox walked over to Sky, and helped him to his feet. He hugged Sky tightly. “I’m so sorry. I want to be brave enough to stay, but I’m not. I’m a coward.”  
Sky clenched his teeth and forced himself to not cry. He hugged Deadlox back. “I’m gonna miss you, Ty.”  
They broke apart after a few minutes. Deadlox smiled sadly, then turned and walked away.  
And the Squid Slayer watched him go, speechless with disbelief and loss.


End file.
